The mining industry has been spending increasing amounts of R&D expenditure. Over the period 1992-93 to 2001-02, expenditure has increased by 203% from $176m in 1992-93 to $534m in 2001-02. At the end of this period, mining accounted for 9.6% of total R&D expenditure by all industries in comparison to 6.2% in 1992-93. The manufacturing industry's share of total R&D expenditure continued to be the highest, accounting for 43% in 2001-02.

Graph 16.21 shows the type of R&D expenditure by the mining industry. For the period 1992-93 to 2001-02, current expenditure other than labour costs is the major component of R&D expenditure for the mining industry, accounting for 82% of mining R&D expenditure in 2001-02. This category includes expenses on materials, fuels, rent and hiring, repairs and maintenance and data processing etc. and the proportion of expenses on general services and overheads attributable to R&D activity. In the mining industry, these expenses increased by $343m (373%) from $92m in 1992-93 to $435m in 2001-02, while the amount spent on labour and capital fell. As a result, labour cost and capital expenditure as a proportion of total R&D expenditure fell to 12% and 6.4% respectively in 2001-02. For all industries, other current expenditure of $2,737m accounted for 49% of total expenditure ($5,546m) in 2001-02, while labour costs contributed 43% ($2,398m) and capital expenditure 7.4% ($410m).

In 2001-02, Queensland accounted for the largest R&D expenditure in the mining industry (41%), followed by Western Australia (23%) and New South Wales (16%). This compares with previous years when Western Australia had the largest expenditure by a wide margin.

The mining industry accounted for a significant proportion of R&D expenditure in Western Australia (30%) and Queensland (30%) compared to 10% nationally, consistent with the importance of the industry to these states.

16.22 EXPENDITURE ON R&D, By selected locations(a)

1997-98

1998-99

1999-2000

2000-01

2001-02

Mining

All
industries

Mining

All
industries

Mining

All
industries

Mining

All
industries

Mining

All
industries

'000

'000

'000

'000

'000

'000

'000

'000

'000

'000

NSW

115,489

1,432,711

91,349

1,391,692

37,265

1,440,297

57,095

1,737,401

84,623

2,070,607

Vic.

32,067

1,444,499

37,940

1,445,212

36,964

1,495,106

31,499

1,718,379

36,176

1,792,740

Qld

123,149

486,278

71,736

437,246

72,642

441,523

116,628

523,953

216,613

722,889

SA

n.p.

241,429

35,072

248,516

20,559

247,342

25,452

295,175

n.p.

364,216

WA

195,735

465,544

214,932

440,177

102,699

336,538

213,426

479,043

122,570

403,628

Other(b)

30,375

122,495

22,368

89,341

17,260

110,832

14,135

99,619

25,206

115,044

Overseas

n.p.

28,105

11,345

42,517

3,882

40,722

4,188

63,788

n.p.

76,411

Total

536,646

4,221,061

484,742

4,094,701

291,271

4,112,360

462,423

4,917,357

533,948

5,545,534

(a) Excludes businesses in Agriculture, forestry and fishing (i.e. in ANZSIC Division A).(b) Other states and territories.

In 2001-02, the mining industry funded most of its R&D expenditure with $520m (97%) sourced from money owned by the mining business (own funds). The remaining expenditure is funded from the Australian Government and businesses in other industries. This compares with the total for all industries of which $4,782m (86%) was sourced from own funds, $268m (4.8%) from the Australian Government, $309m (5.6%) from overseas, $136m (2.5%) from other businesses, and the remainder from state and local government and other Australian (including higher education and private non-profit sectors) sources.